THE FIRST HLA ANTHROPOLOGICAL STUDY IN THE KUWAITI POPULATION

HLA antigens of the Kuwaiti population are not as well characterized a s those of other international ethnic groups. We present results for H LA typing of Kuwaiti individuals using commercial Biotest sera. Six hu ndred and seventy one Kuwaiti were typed for HLA-A, -B, -C antigens an d 399 were typed for HLA-DR, -DQ antigens. Antigen frequency and gene frequency were computed for each phenotype observed. The antigens with the highest frequencies were HLA-A2, A1 and A3; B5, B12 and B7; Cw(-) 4 and Cw(-)1; DR52, DR5, DR3 and DR7; DQ1 and DQ2. HLA haplotypes with strong linkage disequilibrium and characteristic of Kuwaiti populatio n are A2-B5, A1-B8, B7-DR7 and B8-DR3. A comparison study with other p opulations is presented.